


Deeper

by skekMal



Category: The Dark Crystal (1982), The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:53:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27783295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skekMal/pseuds/skekMal
Summary: urVa wants to share some calm with his counterpart.
Relationships: skekMal/urVa (Dark Crystal)
Kudos: 13





	Deeper

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ryanglitter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryanglitter/gifts).



"I want to try something new."

skekMal, finishing the tea he reluctantly but with evident pleasure was drinking, could not fathom - at first - what urVa really meant by that. For him, every new day was trying something new, endlessly pursuing fresh challenges and thrills. With urVa, he indeed was trying something new almost every day they met. For the Hunter, stagnation was as wrong as regress.

He snorted into the rest of the tea. The promise was there, hidden deeply in his counterpart's words.

And he never backed before a challenge, even as strange - or fascinating - it could be.

"Try me."

urVa smiled calmly, not even intending to move from his comfortable place by the fire.

"I indeed want to try you, skekMal. Because not all things are easy and even if you beat every physical challenge with fascinating ease, I would like you to take a challenge that you may...not be fond of" seeing narrowing eyes and the fiery gaze of the skeksis, he fastly added. "But you may prove me wrong. Maybe you will find joy in it. I do - all the time."

skekMal cocked his head with curiosity, a real curiosity, not a tease.

"If you want to teach me how to use that cursed bow of yours..."

"No, not at all" chuckled urVa. "I know already that you... are not happy from killing your prey from distance."

The Archer slowly, very slowly, raised from his seat and taking another cup of tea, a small, flat, wooden mug, he handed it to the Hunter.

"Drink. I chose soothing herbs especially for you, this time. Hoping you will take a challenge."

skekMal took the mug from urVa's hands and swallowed the whole tea that was in it, looking defiantly into Archer's eyes.

"... and my hopes were not futile."

"Get on to it," said skekMal with haste. urVa knew that Hunter's senses are strong, his endurance too... but even if skekMal was exceptionally good at waiting - for his own kind - taught to stay still in one position for many hours, waiting for his prey to do a false move, he still was lord of the crystal, thriving, lively, always ready to act.

"Sit by the fire."

And skekMal did. Moving with hidden swiftness, pretending he isn't impatient, isn't curious. But urVa knew him better than the whole Thra. skekMal only did not ask directly, because he knew it will come by itself.

And because he was not fond of asking. Not when he was with urVa.

"Close your eyes" Hunter's eyelids fell and Archer could see them staying completely still like they didn't sheathe eyes. Perfect stillness of the hunting mode. urVa sat next to him, so they faced each other. One of his hands touched skekMal's tight and the other took his fingers, to place them right on the place where was beating the heart of an urru.  
skekMal didn't move, nor his eyes under lids.

"Odd foreplay, Archer" he growled.

"Ahh, yes" urVa smiled. "Not every touch is a sensual one" his secondary arms tightened the grip on his tights and the one big hand pressed when Hunter's heart was. "Even if it may seem so. I said I want to try something new."

skekMal nodded silently, allowing urVa to continue.

"I wanted to try it for long. I can feel your pain, I can even sometimes feel glimpses of your pleasure. When you are wounded, I am too. But what if... we could feel peace, calm, serenity together?"

skekMal opened his eyes slowly, brows narrowed.

"Don't look like me like that, skekMal. I adapted many habits from you. Thanks to you, I join your hunts, I tolerate meat, I even learned to... like it. Maybe I can give you something only I possess between us both."

"If I didn't know you, I would think you are wanting to make me soft like the urru..."

"...but?"

"... but you are not like the other urru."

urVa offered him a perfectly innocent, kind smile. "Put your second hand on my tight."

skekMal listened. They were now intertwined, holding each other in an odd and complicated embrace. urVa knew that skekMal's mind already gallops forth, but he pretended he doesn't feel sharp talons burying into his skin.

And he let his being envelop the Hunter.

His mind calmed down, fully. The first time when they shared a meal. The first time they slept next to each other, after a tiring day.

Tea. Soft wind. The song of Thra.

The song of Thra. Yes. The gentle touch of the force hidden within the core of the planet, reaching with its light strength into each creature and plant. They both felt it before, joined together, as one. They felt it in the beating of the forest, in the prey skekMal hunted for, in the sky, that vibrated with the unknown and silent tune, with the air they breathed in the cold night.

In the understanding they each other had for themselves.

The rain on their bodies, the touch of leaves as they ran, ran, faster, like the wind.

He saw skekMal, but not with his eyes. He saw him in the head, his core, and his soul, and it was like lighting, like thunder, and gale and flood, breaking the dam.

Do break it, skekMal, do it, nothing can stop you.

He felt as the talons dig deeper into his flesh, but he didn't move.  
urVa knew that skekMal allows him for that. It was like they suddenly became gelfling and Thra gave them the ability to dreamfast. Maybe all counterparts could do that? His rite with hands placement was completely new to him as well, he just thought it was the right thing to do. But the deeper skekMal held him, the deeper he could see into his soul.

The need to calm skekMal quenched and stayed only the need to understand better.

He felt the breathing on his neck, when skekMal leaned with his head against him, like in trance.

But urVa felt also something different. Something completely personal, which he sensed skekMal would never allow touching. Something beyond the hunt, beyond even being a skeksis. Something that smelled of trees and stream and was hard as stone and so intense, so sincere...

The sharp talons dug deeper.

urVa opened his eyes, seeing as skekMal breaths heavily, his body tensed like a rope.

He looked at his tight when the other's hand was placed. Blood.

skekMal leaned back, his throat forming a growl.

"I am sorry, skekMal... I never thought I will be so close to---"

The Hunter scoffed, removing his hands from the urru's body.

"You didn't suspect we can go to the bottom, don't you?"

urVa looked at him sheepishly.

"The only gelfling can dreamfast. I never thought that..."

"This wasn't dreamfasting and you know that" cut skekMal, standing up, his tail lashing wildly.

urVa nodded gravely.

"I wanted to ask you, many times. But now I know, I can't. I shouldn't. You are exceptional unknow skekMal. And I want it to stay that way."

skekMal growled again. He took a cup that left after tea they drank.

"Good, Archer. Now do something useful with this empty mug."

"That is...?"

"Make me another one."

*

When they were both laying by the fire, and the dream wasn't coming, the night's air touching them with soft caress, urVa's hands involuntarily wandered to embrace the Hunter. He felt like skekMal moves in sleep, but knowing Hunter, the sleep was only one eye slumber, sleep as alert as his awake.

He breathed into skekMal's neck, feeling his tail wrap around his waist.

"Thank you" urVa murmured only.

skekMal seemed to not hear, but urVa knew he did. And this was a gift on its own.


End file.
